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My One "Paranormal" Experience

fromdownunder

Philosopher
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It was a few years ago - somewhere between 1993 - 1995, but it was the wierdest thing (in the "paranormal" sense) that ever happened to me.

My daughter and I were discussing movies, and she started describing a movie we had both seen at one time or another, set mostly in the Sydney Opera House. Neither of us could remember the name of it, and it got frustrating trying to think of the name of the damn thing.

So, I said I will find it. I got out my Movie book (not Maltin's guide - a similar type guide from another publisher), closed my eyes, opened it up randomly and pointed at a line.

I opened my eyes, and there it was - an Australian movie called One Night Stand set in Sydney with WW3 about to happen. And it was the movie we were thinking about.

Not bad, but if that is the best, and only thing I have done in 57 years, I doubt that there is much in my "paranormal" ability that will start a revolution.

Has anybody else that has a "one off paranormal coincidence" (if that is not a contradiction in terms) that can match mine?

Norm
 
Welcome to the forum!

This is called a coincidence - why do you label it as paranormal? It might be paranormal if you repeated the event several times in succession, but not as a one-off.

I also wonder how perfect your memory is about this. If I was checking a book to identify a film in such a manner (and I have done so before), I think I would flip through the pages, watching them, rather than closing my eyes and sticking my finger in one place.

I have had experiences that seemed paranormal at the time, but most have been reviewable as coincidence, or other such mundane things. One evening though I amazed myself and my friends by sucessfully predicting almost every video that was shown on the tv channel we had on in the background. That was a very odd experience, but still probably nothing more than coincidence, confirmation bias and restriction to the genre of the channel.
 
Hi, fromdownunder, I'm with chillzero here, could you please explain what was paranormal about what happened? One of the big problems with some of the discussions here is the way people miss-use terminology. What you've described could be called lucky, coincidence or whatever but not paranormal.

I know this sounds harsh, but this all goes back to the fact that all of us would want to have a proper paranormal experience. I'd love to be able to cheat chance or read minds or anything like that. It'd rock! Given this situation it's hardly surprising that the human mind being what it is, spots little things like this and holds them up as something special.
 
Actually, chillzero, my memory is pretty absolute about this one. And so is my daughters. But only because it is the only really wierd thing that has ever happened to me to this extent (I mean by this that life itself is basically wierd).

It is an event etched in me that I will never forget. I genuinely had no idea what the title was. Obviously had it not started with a letter from about g-s, it could never have happened, because I simply opened the book in the middle 1/3rd, and would have regardless of what the title actually was.

Please note the last paragraph of my OP. I take the paranormal with a grain, actually, a pound of salt. With six plus billion people on this mudball, coincidences, or what some would describe as paranormal, probably occur 100's of times per day.

I called it my one "paranormal" experience to fit the theme of the forum I was posting on and wondered if any other people had similar, well, curious, wierd ("paranormal") events, happen to them.

But trust me, it happened.

Norm
 
fromdownunder said:
Actually, chillzero, my memory is pretty absolute about this one. And so is my daughters. But only because it is the only really wierd thing that has ever happened to me to this extent (I mean by this that life itself is basically wierd).

It is an event etched in me that I will never forget. I genuinely had no idea what the title was. Obviously had it not started with a letter from about g-s, it could never have happened, because I simply opened the book in the middle 1/3rd, and would have regardless of what the title actually was.

Please note the last paragraph of my OP. I take the paranormal with a grain, actually, a pound of salt. With six plus billion people on this mudball, coincidences, or what some would describe as paranormal, probably occur 100's of times per day.

I called it my one "paranormal" experience to fit the theme of the forum I was posting on and wondered if any other people had similar, well, curious, wierd ("paranormal") events, happen to them.

But trust me, it happened.

Norm
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I don't doubt it happened. I just don't think it is paranormal. The book had to fall open somewhere, so the fact that it fell open at the page you needed was just a nice coincidence.
 
Forgot to say again - do it a few times - then it's approaching paranormal.

:)
 
Hi, robbersdog, see my response to chillzero.

I would love to repeat what I did. But I would not even know how to start duplicating the event.

And a reading of my OP will show that while I may have been very surprised at the result, I was not all that impressed by it as evidence of anything in particular, except that wierd things actually do happen, and one of them happened to me.

Norm
 
OK, I suppose I have used the word paranormal as a more general term than is used as the overarching definition of the term as required on this forum. I'll look for a more user friendly board to post this sort of stuff.

Edited to add: The odds of doing what I actually did were probably only around 16,000 to one as a worst case. Given that I would have probably always opened the book in the middle third, that reduces the odds to about 5,350 to one. Still remote, but not as high as I originally thought.

But just 'cause I am feeling stupid, and a bit drunk (that's Australian for drunk) at the moment, somebody think of a movie (pre 2005) post a "I've thought of one" here in the next 5 minutes, and I will open Maltin's 2005 guide, point and respond with what I pointed at. If I get it right, I might, just might go for the $1 Million. :)

Norm
 
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Well, I know it isn't 5 mins, but if you are still there - I've thought of one.

:)

Don't bail out just yet - I am sorry if I gave you the impression I was not being "user friendly". I was just responding to your questions, and if you'll notice I even answered your opening question with a weird experience of my own. This is how conversations develop. ;)
 
chillzero said:
Welcome to the forum!

This is called a coincidence - why do you label it as paranormal? It might be paranormal if you repeated the event several times in succession, but not as a one-off.
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When people say "paranormal happens", those are the kinds of events that they are talking about. I got the impression that the OP referred to the event as paranormal because it is the kind of event a believer would label as paranormal, even if the OP did not believe that her/himself.

I propose that it's a mistake to quibble over what can be labelled paranormal, because it is unpersuasive to the person who had the experience. I don't think that what makes something paranormal is the relative probability. For your example, an unlikely event is not paranormal, but a highly unlikely event (i.e. an unlikely event repeated several times) is? The relative probability (which most people are not good at guessing anyway) seems to have a poor correlation with whether someone labels an event paranormal. Instead, it seems to be the "Wow Factor" (WF) that matters.

I'm suggesting that the WF is actually independent of the probability of the event occurring. Pointing out that highly unlikely events are still likely to happen over the course of a lifetime, doesn't address the fact that this particular event felt weird. Plus people generally have a poor intuitive understanding of probability. So they aren't picking out the most improbable events in their lives to label paranormal, but rather events that for some other reason generate "Wow".

When someone comes here and talks about their particular paranormal experience, instead of pointing out that it needs to be highly unlikely to be considered paranormal (not true), talk about why it felt weird.

Linda
 
Fromdownunder,

Please don't run off because some of us aren't impressed by your contribution to tales of the wierd. I'm sorry to say that, at least for me, it isn't in the big leagues. in 55 years of life, I've had a number of nice coincidences including a couple opening the book just to the right pagers. My favorites have been having a book that I dreamed about crossing my path the next day and a dream in which my girlfriend told me to get out of her life that was fulfilled the following day to every detail of place, what she said, and how I reacted, All seen to be coincidental by examination.

We tend to run with things like that. They startle us, so we find them mysterious and make more of them than what they are.

BTW open a book to a page. Open it out flat, Now close the book and let it flip open. Sometimes I don't bother to use a book mark depending on the binding. Books are more likely to flip open to pages where they have already been opened.
 
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chillzero said:
Well, I know it isn't 5 mins, but if you are still there - I've thought of one.

:)

I am not bailing out, I have been over on IIDB and CF. I enjoy discussion too much to bail out, so don't take me too seriously. I will go with three movies:

Aaron Slick From Punkin Crick
Gone With the Wind
Zardoz

Did I get a letter right? :)

Norm
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fls said:
When someone comes here and talks about their particular paranormal experience, instead of pointing out that it needs to be highly unlikely to be considered paranormal (not true), talk about why it felt weird.

Linda
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Excuse me. Linda, but I'll respond in my own manner, thanks.

The poster himself said he felt this was a contradiction in terms, and I agree, and asked a legitimate question.

And, in addition, I responded to his actual question with an event of my own. It was a really odd experience, and I would be happy to expand on it, but wasn't in the mood earlier to type up a big long response detailing the whole event. I was waiting to see if anyone was interested in it.
 
fromdownunder said:
chillzero said:
Well, I know it isn't 5 mins, but if you are still there - I've thought of one.

:)

I am not bailing out, I have been over on IIDB and CF. I enjoy discussion too much to bail out, so don't take me too seriously. I will go with three movies:

Aaron Slick From Punkin Crick
Gone With the Wind
Zardoz

Did I get a letter right? :)

Norm
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Ooooh!!!
No.
:P

It was "Arsenic and Old Lace".

Mind you... arsenic ...aaron slick .... (say it quickly!) ;)
You were close after all. :D
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Sorry people, it's after midnight here and I have to be at work in 6 hours. So I will leave with this and catch up later.

I get the impression that despite my disclaimers, (I thought even my OP indicated that while I thought what happened was wierd, I did not think that there was anything particularly unique about it) some people still seem to think that I am making some sort of claim.

Sorry if I gave that impression. I thought it was an interesting anecdote as to how some things can happen despite the odds, which I narrowed to about 5,350 to one on post #8.

If you wanted a woo to play with, you have come to the wrong shop. That having been said, I will reply to anybody late (my time) tomorrow.

Regards

Norm
 
i think i got your drift. i think where the confusion came up is you shoulda just said "anyone else have seemingly paranormal experiences?"

i like to hear about crazy coincidence. something i do for fun is call out the numbers for the lottery as my wife and i watch the drawings (if we happen to flip to it). we never play because we know the odds are so against winning and we would rather not get addicted to it, but for fun i try to "predict" the numbers. usually i am incredibly and horribly wrong and this just works to reinforce our resolve not to waste our money, but last night i called out all three numbers on the basic cash 3 game in the exact order they appeared. my wife and i laughed, but if she hadnt seen all my failures, i bet she woudlve been really blown away.

ETA: i looked it up and the max i couldve won was $500, haha. and add to that the fact that the winning number was "357" and i think you would agree that of the possible random number combos, that combo is common enough in popular culture that it is more likely that it would pop into my head
 
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chillzero said:
Excuse me. Linda, but I'll respond in my own manner, thanks.
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I didn't mean to give the impression that I was telling you what to do. I had prefaced my idea with "I propose" and "I suggest", but I should have given a stronger emphasis to what I meant.

It is my impression that we (skeptics generally) are not as persuasive as we could be, and to that end I have been making an informal study of methods. This is simply my latest attempt/trial towards finding an effective strategy. If my words had been bracketed with "I propose that a change in tactics may prove more persuasive and insightful since part of the problem is that we seem to be addressing the wrong issues (isolated probabilities)......What do you think?", that would have given a clearer indication of my intentions. Maybe still unacceptable, though. <g>

Linda
 
fls said:
I didn't mean to give the impression that I was telling you what to do. I had prefaced my idea with "I propose" and "I suggest", but I should have given a stronger emphasis to what I meant.

It is my impression that we (skeptics generally) are not as persuasive as we could be, and to that end I have been making an informal study of methods. This is simply my latest attempt/trial towards finding an effective strategy. If my words had been bracketed with "I propose that a change in tactics may prove more persuasive and insightful since part of the problem is that we seem to be addressing the wrong issues (isolated probabilities)......What do you think?", that would have given a clearer indication of my intentions. Maybe still unacceptable, though. <g>

Linda
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Not unacceptable, no. It would have made your intent clearer. And then I might not have thrown a wee hissy fit. :D

I still stand by how I responded anyway. I asked the question that the post raised in my mind, and then answered the question that was asked.

so - what about you? Ever had one occasion when something happened that was really odd?
 
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